Days Off and Laptops
by Vinton Swaine
Summary: Valkyrie, Skulduggery and Tanith find their origins. 'Nough Said!
1. The Day the Laptop Got Too Much

**Hi… Well I have no idea what I am doing on this website. My friends were recommending it to me, so… Still, no idea… so I think that I'll start with a one/two-shot about Skulduggery Pleasant **(and the third book is an R.I.P. (Read in Progress)** just to start me off** (though knowing me, I'll make it much longer)**. So here we go… any second… wait for it… GO!!**

One day when Skulduggery, Tanith and Valkyrie weren't saving the world from destruction, they decided to take a break.

Tanith was getting stuck into another of Gordon's books; Skulduggery was looking at Jennifer Aniston in _OK!_and liking what he was seeing and Valkyrie on her laptop.

Everything was quiet for a very long time when suddenly Valkyrie jumped out of her seat and shouted, "It's us!"

Instantly Skulduggery and Tanith leapt to their feet simultaneously and raced to see what 'was them'. They saw what she was talking about.

"How did you find this?" Skulduggery asked excitingly, beating Tanith to the sentence.

"I was on my laptop when I accidentally clicked a button and this thing called Google," and clicked onto .uk. "It shows you everything about everything. So I typed 's' and 'skulduggery pleasant' was fourth in the suggestion list."

Skulduggery input, "Only fourth, eh?"

Valkyrie continued, "Anyway, apparently this man knows all about us has been writing stories about our fights against Serpine, the Grotesquery and the Faceless Ones."

"That's weird," Tanith queried quickly. It was 1-1 in the 'fast sentence' contest. "What's his name?"

"Um…" Valkyrie said, scrolling down the page. "Derek Landy."

"That's Gordon's friend!" Skulduggery said, jogging his memory.

"Wow!" Valkyrie and Tanith exclaimed together.

Tanith then got suspicious, "How does he know about me and Valkyrie though?"

Skulduggery and Valkyrie froze. It seemed their free day had come to an abrupt end.


	2. A Little Research

I knew that I'd do this! I always do. This is no longer a one-shot but a… full-shot? Anyway Flaring Rhythm will kill me if I don't do this soon, so…

The rest of the day consisted of Skulduggery with his ear (or ear hole?) stuck to his phone, Valkyrie with her hands stuck to her laptop and Tanith with her face stuck to her book. She was doing this as Skulduggery's ear (hole?) was stuck to his phone and Valkyrie's hands were stuck to her laptop leaving her with nothing to do.

They'd been researching this Derek Landy fellow who'd somehow found out that Skulduggery had gotten himself a sidekick called Stephanie who made her taken name Valkyrie, a super-quick sword-mistress called Tanith and had battled Nefarian Serpine, the Grotesquery, the Faceless Ones, the list goes on.

After a few hours Valkyrie found some drawings on Google Images that looked like her, Skulduggery, Tanith and Ghastly ("I look good in that one," Skulduggery said, to which Valkyrie replied, "I think it's me that you're pointing to," moving Skulduggery's metatarsals (BTW metatarsals are the bones in your hand) to the picture of her holding a skull.)

"Hey, that's you're real skull!" Valkyrie said, astonished.

"Feels good to have it back on," Skulduggery replied, making sure it was still there.

"This is too strange too weird," Valkyrie said, starting to feel as if she was being watched at that very moment.

Then it hit her. If there was one thing that could give the most similar evidence to Gordon, it could only be Echo-Gordon!

"I -uh- have to go to the bathroom." she said quickly threw the laptop onto the seat and bolted upstairs.


	3. EchoGordon

Haven't got much of an authors note on this chapter. I would just like to thank everyone that reviewed my first two chapters and you know what they say. Third time's the charm, so I hope you like this chapter as much as the others…

Valkyrie crossed the hall to Gordon's study, opened the door and crossed the room to the title-less book. She it pulled it to revealed the chamber, cave, well whatever you want to call it but I'm going to call it a chamber – anyway, she revealed the chamber and walked into it, coming right up to Echo-Gordon's stone.

He popped out of it instantly. "Hi, Stephanie!" he greeted, and as Gordon never about Valkyrie Cain, Echo-Gordon always her Stephanie. "How's life been with you?"

"Good, thanks," she replied, always admiring his politeness. She had always expected Echoes to be feeling-less, but from the two that she had met (which was a real honour seeing as they are so rare) she found them to even have the exact manners, feelings, and sayings and so on as the real person. "Gordon, I just wanted to ask about a man called Derek Landy?"

"Oh, I haven't seen Landy in years!" Echo-Gordon exclaimed.

'Duh!' thought Valkyrie, though she never say it as she would consider it rude to insult his dead uncle.

"He and I met in college," Echo-Gordon continued. "We sat beside each other in English Lit. He was so humorous, funny and comical."

'Those are the same, aren't they?' Valkyrie thought, wondering whether the stone was malfunctioning.

"I always knew he was destined to be an author."

"Did you ever say anything to him about me?" Valkyrie asked hesitantly.

"I might have mentioned I had a niece but I didn't say much more than that."

"And what about Tanith? Did you ever say anything about her?"

"No, never. Why are you asking me these questions Valkyrie?"

"Because Derek has started writing about Skulduggery, Tanith, Ghastly and me."

"Well that is just terrible. I don't know how he would get that information. Perhaps Ghastly could shed some light on that. He knew Derek as well. "

Valkyrie thanked him and sped off downstairs, where Skulduggery and Tanith were wondering if she'd fallen down the toilet.

Valkyrie suggested, "Maybe we should go to Ghastly. Whilst in the toilet, I thought Ghastly is the only one not here and is the only other person, apart form Skulduggery, that had known Gordon before he died."

"That's some capital thinking there, Valkyrie," Skulduggery praised. " I'll phone him to say that we're dropping by."

Skulduggery phoned Ghastly and they got into the Bentley.


	4. Ghastly Bespoke

Uuumm… Here's the next chapter…

They pulled up outside Ghastly's shop and casually walked in as usual. They were planning to do a 'good cop, bad cop' approach, but thought that might be a little strange to do on a best friend, so instead they tried, "Hi, Ghastly. How are you?"

"I'm good," he replied. "You?"

"Well, I was wanting to ask you some questions. Is that OK?"

Ghastly started to get to fidget. "Well, uh, sure," he agreed suspiciously. "Fire away."

"First, do you know Derek Landy?"

Ghastly paused. "Uh, yeah. Gordon knew him."

"Second, do you speak to him often?"

"Well, not really. Like I said 5 seconds ago, he was Gordon's friend. I only ever him once or twice."

Skulduggery lowered his jawbone, but tightened it again. He was starting to think that this was looking to be an interrogation instead of a casual chat. His thoughts were confirmed when Ghastly asked, "Why are you interrogating me?"

"We're not," Skulduggery replied. " It's just…" and he broke off.

Ghastly started to get concerned, "Its just what, Skulduggery?"

"This man, Derek Landy, has been finding out about me, Valkyrie, you, Tanith and everyone else that's been on our adventures. He knows about the White Cleaver forcing you use your Earth power, about the Grotesquery, the…"

"Skulduggery!" Ghastly interrupted. "Everyone who's anyone knew about those things!"

"I know," Skulduggery replied "But he knew about every sentence we made, every face we pulled, every…" he stopped. Ghastly had started to edge towards the door to the fabric store. "What are you doing?" Skulduggery asked confusedly.

"I'm just, uh, going to make some clothes" Ghastly said hesitantly, and hurried towards the door.

Skulduggery started running for it, too. It was almost a dead heat.

"What are you doing?!" Skulduggery repeated more forcefully. He didn't wait for a reply this time, but just through the door open.

"YOU!!!" Skulduggery exclaimed, because sitting at Ghastly's desk was the one and only – you guessed it – Derek Landy!


	5. Derek Landy and Fletcher Renn

**Look, I know it's been a few months but it has given me time to read the Faceless Ones and Dark Days, so I am proud to announce that Fletch **_**shall **_**make an appearance. And, if I feel like it, the members of The Revenge Club may or may not make an appearance. So, here goes…**

Everyone who was in the room at the time was speechless, all for their respective reasons. "Hello Derek." Skulduggery broke the silence, in a disapproving tone.

"Um…Skulduggery…This is awkward and unexpected."

Before anything else could be said Fletcher teleported into the room and said to Valkyrie and Skulduggery's surprise, "Hiya, Derek."

"Fletcher," Valkyrie asked, trying to keep calm. "Were have you been?"

"The author didn't know about me." Fletcher said indifferently.

"I thought Derek was the author here?"

"No, the one writing this story. Derek's not the author of this one."

"Great," Skulduggery said, then turned to Derek. "Now we're a cult as well. What's next? Non-magical people having taken names?"

Fletcher looked to the ground, "…Like Flaring Rhythm, Shakra Flame, Druna Malgood…"

"Exactly!" Skulduggery exclaimed. Then his voice lowered. "You don't make up very good ones, by the way. Their first names spell D.F.S. like the sofa company. Let's called them Crazies instead."

"They already are. There are real non-magicals called that. They stalk me sometimes.

Derek butted in, "What does have to do with me?"

Skulduggery's eyes rolled (though you couldn't see it, obviously), "You made our world famous. It's supposed to be secret." He then paused. "How do you know anyway?"

"Gordon shared secrets with me," Derek said, "And they were so fascinating. A skeleton man, magic powers, world Sanctuaries, it was so amazing. I could never have written about it if he were alive. When he died I suddenly imagined the success of this world as a book, but I could never imagine real people ever finding out."

"Gordon," Skulduggery whispered. "I think we should talk in the main room."

Thanks to Druna Malgood, Flaring Rhythm and Shakra (a.k.a. D.F.S., The Crazies) for their general frantic behaviour outside the Maths block. Without them this chapter wouldn't be half as long.


End file.
